Upstairs, Kristen began to cry in relief. Across the yard, Brenna turned away to hide her own tears. Both women smiled, sure now that their men would live. The Vikings did not so much care that the thrust of the fight had changed. They still cheered on their man, as did the Saxons across from them.
When it was finished a long while later, Royce could not raise his head to save his soul. Garrick, still on his knees, was hailed the victor just before he keeled over on top of Royce. The yard was quiet then. The possibility that both men would still live had not been considered.
Kristen allowed no time for them to consider it at all. She ran toward the fallen combatants and gave orders they should both be taken into the hall. When no Saxon moved to obey her, she pierced Alden with a furious glare. "Do not make me regret forgiving you, Saxon. Get them moving!" He did, and Kristen quickly picked up one of the discarded swords as her uncle and most of the others approached. She faced Hugh with it, brandishing it before her. "It is done, Uncle Hugh," she warned him angrily. "I am going to marry that Saxon now, and woe betide anyone who dares to stop me. He has fought for the right to demand peace. Give it to him." Hugh threw back his head and laughed mightily. He slapped Brenna on the back, which sent her stumbling ahead. "Like mother, like daughter, eh, Brenna? Odin help us all if this is the new breed of women we are raising on our shores." Brenna turned around to glare at her brother-in-law. "Oaf! And how would she have survived here if I had not taught her how? Give her the answer she awaits, Hugh." He smiled at his niece. "Aye, your man fought well. He can have his peace." "And you will all leave?" "Not until we see you properly wed." Kristen grinned, and then she burst into joyous laughter and threw herself into her uncle's mighty arms.
Chapter Forty-four
.Royce was not so stiff and sore today, but he still did not think he was ready to crawl from his bed. He was improving after three days, but he had never felt so wretched in his life. For a while it had seemed as if every bone in his body had been broken. Some were, and Kristen had bound his chest tightly to set the cracked ribs.
But he did not need to leave his bed to know what was going on in his hall. It seemed as if everyone in Wyndhurst had traipsed through his chamber at one time or another. His people to see how he fared, Kristen's people to meet the man who would marry their fair flower of Norway. Darrelle came the most, for she was in a state bordering on hysteria with so many Vikings in her hall. Alden was amused by it all. And Meghan, that amazing child, was awed and delighted with their visitors, and had even come to tell him excitedly that Kristen's uncle Hugh had promised to show her his Viking ship. The change wrought in his sister, thanks to Kristen, was truly a wonder. But then, the vixen had changed him, too.
He wondered sometimes if the fates hadn't corrected the error in taking his first love in a Viking raid, by sending him Kristen in another raid. She had certainly healed the emptiness he had lived with all these years. He rarely thought of Rhona anymore. When he tried to picture her in his mind, it was aqua eyes he saw, and flowing tawny hair. And Kristen loved him. After all he had put her through, she actually loved him. This would never cease to amaze him.
The only one who had not come to his chamber to see him was Kristen's father. Brenna had told him with a half smile that Garrick was not up to leaving his bed, either. That confession had made Royce's day, for he dearly hoped the older man was suffering just as much as he was. The man had wanted his blood, and Royce had spit mouthfuls of it. He could wait until doomsday before he had to come face to face with that merciless Viking again.
Doomsday arrived three days later, or so Royce felt. Kristen rushed in to warn him, only seconds beforehand, that her father was coming. Royce buried his head under his pillow. She giggled and swiped it away from him. And then Garrick Haardrad appeared in the doorway, filling it with his large frame.
He had seen the superb body in action, but this was the first opportunity Royce had to really look the man over. He did not look old enough to have a son only five or six years younger than Royce.
It did not sit well with Royce at all, knowing that he had been trounced soundly by a man nearly two score years his senior, and a merchant, a man who by rights should have grown soft with his advancing years. And worse, he was up and about first. Royce knew the power of his own strength. A man Garrick's age should have been bedridden for a fortnight at the very least.
Yet here he stood, straight and tall, with only a few remaining signs giving testimony to their battle: a scab on his lip, a bruise still on one cheek, a slight discoloration beneath one eye. Royce wished he could have seen the eye when it was at its blackest and still swollen. God's breath, he resented the Viking's ability to heal so quickly.
Garrick wore a sleeveless leather tunic with his long, tight-fitted leggings. His soft-skinned boots were studded with gold and came to his knees. Golden links also trimmed the tunic. In fact, he was a walking fortune, with a gold buckle the size of a fist on his belt, gold with precious jewels winking from his fingers, a solid-gold medallion on his chest, and more gold clasped to his wrists.
Royce found to his consternation that he was intimidated, not by the wealth and strength that exuded from every inch of the man, but by Garrick's grim visage. This was Kristen's father. One word from him and Royce could lose her.
It might be true that the wedding feast had begun, flaunting tradition, before the wedding, and without the happy couple in attendance. In fact it began on the very day of the battle, because Hugh Haardrad had claimed they would have to sail for home before winter made the voyage too difficult, that they could not afford to wait until Royce recovered. So they began the celebrating before the fact, as Viking celebrations had to be long, drawn-out affairs or Kristen would not feel she had been properly wed. So Hugh claimed.
This had made Royce feel the matter was settled. And yet, looking at Kristen's father, he knew it was not. He still had to have this man's approval, and at the moment Garrick did not look as if he would give it.
The fact that Kristen was smiling softened the edges of Royce's rising panic. If she did not see anything amiss in her father's stern countenance, mayhap Royce was overreacting. After all, he did not know the man. It was possible he always looked so forbidding. Brenna came up behind Garrick and pushed him gently into the room. She came around the side of the bed and sat down next to Kristen. She also had a stem look about her as her gray eyes traveled down Royce, stretched out stiffly in the bed. "I realize you must enjoy my daughter's pampering, Royce, but enough is enough," Brenna told him with marked disapproval. "If my husband can manage to be up and about, so can you. I will see Kristen wed today." Emerald eyes flew to the Viking to see if he would disclaim that statement. When he did not, Royce relaxed. In fact his earlier resentment toward the man returned.
He managed to sit up without flinching once. " 'Twas no more than a courtesy, madam. I did not want to force your husband out of his bed to attend the wedding, before he was able." "Royce!" Kristen gasped. Brenna grinned, forming a retort that was cut short by her husband. Garrick threw back his head and laughed. "Is that so, Saxon? If I had known that was your only excuse, I would not have let my wife coddle me for so long." Now Brenna gasped, and Kristen giggled. "Such baldfaced lies, from the both of you. What do we do with them, Mother?" "I do not know what you will do," Brenna retorted, "but if your father does not mind his tongue, he will find himself back in bed." "We just left there, mistress," Garrick replied with a wolfish grin. "But if you wish to return..." Kristen watched her mother blush and chided Garrick. "Father, please. Royce does not realize you tease. You shock him." "If I do, then I must needs apologize for the beating I gave him. But I could have sworn I was told you shared his bed this whole summer long." If Royce had not been shocked before, he was now. He noticed Kristen blushing and felt heat in his own cheeks. Garrick's humor was flown. The man had become too serious of a sudden. And now he knew from where Kristen got her mercurial changes in emotion.
"You tried your best to kill me for that,"
Royce reminded Garrick sharply. "If you still want to—" "Do not be a fool," Garrick cut him short. "I could not kill you after Brenna told me how our daughter feels about you." "You could have had Thorolf tell me that!" Kristen cried. "So you could tell him?" Garrick shook his head. "Nay, Kris, it had to be the way it was, to satisfy everyone. But he deserved the beating." Brenna sighed. "Your father forgets his own youth, love." She gave Garrick a meaningful look before she smiled at Kristen. "But then, he is unreasonable where you are concerned." Although she moved to stand by Garrick's side, taking his hand in hers, Brenna still addressed Kristen. "Tis not so much that you were bedded, but that you were not wedded first. We both object to that, and so we will see the matter corrected." Royce had yet to hear a confirmation from Kristen's father. He demanded it now. "Do I have your blessing, then?" Brenna jabbed Garrick in the side when he did not answer immediately. "Aye!" he exploded.
Royce began to laugh, having seen the flinch of pain cross Garrick's features. But then he groaned, feeling his own, and it was Garrick's turn to laugh. "At least I do not have to prove myself this eventide," Garrick could not resist saying. And for that he got a scowl that made him laugh the harder, which brought another jab in his ribs from his wife.
Brenna told her daughter, "His cousins have made all the arrangements, so I will take your father below if you will see Royce prepared." Then she pushed Garrick, who was still chuckling, out of the room.
Kristen closed the door after them, then turned with a half smile toward Royce. "They take getting used to," she offered. He could see she was trying hard not to laugh. She had been bubbling with good humor ever since her parents had moved into the hall. Surrounded by her family and friends, she could not have been happier, and he was loath to spoil it by complaining about her father. Hesitantly he asked, "You will miss them, when they sail?" She smiled in earnest now, coming toward him. She moved between his legs, draping her arms loosely about his neck. "Aye, but Father has promised to visit us. Tis not such a long voyage, to sail here for the summer." Royce groaned inwardly. "I suppose 'twill not be often?" he asked hopefully. "Mayhap every other summer." He hid his cringe in her breast. And then the scent of her assailed him and he forgot about her parents.
His arms wrapped about her waist and he looked up at her, his chin resting in the deep V of her green velvet gown. She had worn her own clothes ever since he had admitted to her that he loved her. There had never been any mention of her previous status. She had simply shed the mantle of slavery as easily as she had worn it, making him realize that she had never really worn it at all.
The dark green of the gown added a darker hue to her eyes, making them more turquoise. A wealth of love and tenderness filled his own eyes. "They have waited nigh a week for this wedding." His lips pressed forward against her skin before he added, "Dare we make them wait a while longer?" "You jest, milord." Her palms cupped his cheeks, before she bent to run her tongue slowly, sensually over his lips. "Surely you are not suggesting..." She giggled as he pulled her down onto his lap. "Aye, I jest, vixen. But you could change my mind." "Can I?" Her hand on the back on his neck drew his lips back to hers. "Then mayhap I will, milord. Aye, mayhap..."
Johanna Lindsey, Hearts Aflame
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